Here are ten well-used and time-tested “rules” or principles of business. I abbreviated them and added some comments, and chose ones I like and think about and apply often. Each has expanded versions and come from books that should be read, but this list is a pretty good way to start thinking in a more focused way, enjoy!
Comment: I dispensed with the quotation marks and paraphrased some, but none are original thoughts of mine except those from my Power Bites book.
- Occam’s Razor: When multiple explanations are provided, the simplest usually will work the best.
- Parkinson’s Law: Work expands to fill the time available for its completion. Expenditures rise to meet income. The amount of time spent on an agenda item in a meeting is inversely proportionate to its importance, i.e., more time is spent on lesser items than the more important ones.
- Peter Principle: Employees tend to rise to their level of incompetence. They keep getting promoted until they finally reach a level they cannot perform well at, where they remain.
- Murphy’s Law: If anything can go wrong, it will. Nothing is as easy as it looks. If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong.
- Ed Mendlowitz’s Power Bites: Nothing speaks with greater assurance than a proper presentation of facts. When others push your pencil, make sure it is your pencil. The alternative to getting what you want is reduced expectations.
- Pareto Principle: 80% of the results come from 20% of the efforts. 80% of the profits come from 20% of the customers. Maybe not an exact scientific law, but it means that the benefits are usually disproportionate to the inputs, or a small number of directed inputs produce a large proportion of the benefits.
- Jack Welch: Reality is what it is, not what you want it to be.
- Frederick Adler: Happiness is a positive cash flow.
- Jim Collins: Good is the enemy of great. When things are going well, there is no impetus to make them better or move closer to being great since there is settling for what is good enough.
- Papert’s Principle: Some of the most critical steps in growth are not based on acquiring new skills but on acquiring new ways to use what is already known. This means better management of what you already know.
These pithy sayings contain great truths and work. Enjoy!
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